Officers discovered the device in a house in the Woodhazel area of Ballymun in north Dublin, and immediately called in an Army bomb disposal team.

A cordon was erected around the area on Wednesday night and a number of roads were closed for public safety while gardai evacuated several nearby houses.

The device was made safe without the need for a controlled explosion and the alert ended in less than 45 minutes.

The pipebomb was taken away to a military location for further testing before the component parts were handed over to garda forensic officers for examination.

While the garda were cordoing off the area, officers recovered a quantity of drugs elsewhere.

Last week a bomb disposal team made safe a viable pipebomb left outside a house near a children’s hospital.

Gardai called in military ordnance experts after the explosive device was discovered outside the home at Errigal Road in the south Dublin suburb of Drimnagh.

The house is situated close to Our Lady’s children’s hospital in Crumlin.

Roads were sealed off while a cordon was placed around the area during the military operation and a number of nearby houses were also evacuated. But the running of the hospital was not affected by the operation.

This followed the discovery of a pipebomb left outside a house in the Moneymore area of Drogheda, days earlier.

Bomb teams have been called out 83 times so far this year and made safe 31 viable improvised explosive devices.